Uber sehr schnelle electrische Schwingungen [Ueber sehr schnelle electrische Schwingungen] WITH Nachtrag zu der Abhandlung uber sehr schnelle electrische Schwingungen WITH Uber einen Einfluss des ultravioletten Lichtes auf die electrische Entladung in Annalen der Physik und Chemie, 31, neue Folge, 1887, pp. 421-448, 543-544, 983-1000

Leipzig: Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1887. 1st Edition. BOUND FIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING OF HERTZ’S FIRST THREE PAPERS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC WAVES, THE DISCOVERY OF THE PRODUCTION BY ELECTRICAL DISCHARGE OF WAVES WHICH HAVE THE PROPERTY OF VERY LONG WAVES" – THE FOUNDATION OF WIRELESS COMMUNICATION (H.M. Evans). Complete volume. Here Hertz demonstrates what Maxwell had predicted – that electromagnetic waves radiated in space with the speed of light. It was the first conclusive proof of the existence of electromagnetic waves theorized by Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory of light.

Heinrich Hertz (1857-1894) was a German physicist. When he first “entered physics in the 1870's, electrodynamics was in a disorganized state. Theories had multiplied in its fifty years of development, and each had its own following.

To encourage. the experimental decision between electrodynamic theories Helmholtz proposed through the Berlin Academy of Sciences in 1879 a second prize problem, this one in connection with the behavior of unclosed Circuits in Maxwell's theory. Although at the time Hertz declined to try the Berlin Academy problem, [Hertz] kept the problem constantly in mind; and in 1886 shortly after arriving in Karisruhe he found that the Riess or Knochenhauer induction coils he was using in lecture demonstrations were precisely the means he needed for undertaking Helmholtz' test of Maxwell's theory. By the end of 1888 [Hertz] had gone beyond the terms of Helmholtz’s problem and had confirmed the existence of electromagnetic waves in air” (Dictionary of Scientific Biography, VI, 341). His work drew global attention immediately.

“In his first paper Hertz described the apparatus that he had devised for the detection and measurement of electromagnetic waves, the key to his later successes. To prove that electrical waves can be projected though space it was necessary to devise a means of both producing the waves and, more difficult at the time, of detecting them once produced. For this Hertz used ‘an effect as old as the discovery of electricity itself-the electric spark. By inducing the waves to produce an electric spark at a distance, with no apparent connection between the oscillator and the spark gap, and by moving the sparking apparatus so that the length of the spark varied, he proved beyond question the passage of electric waves through space’ (ibid; Printing and the Mind of Man 377).

"Hertz's proof was the result of his experimental inventiveness. He regarded his detection device as his most original stroke, since no amount of theory would have predicted that it would work" (DSB). In his paper on ultraviolet light Hertz showed that UV light is alone responsible for the photoelectric effect, an effect which he foresaw as having "profound theoretical meaning for the connection of light and electricity" (DSB).

ALSO INCLUDED: The volume also includes papers by Max Planck, W C. Rontgen, R. Bunsen, among others. Item #756

CONDITION & DETAILS: Leipzig: Johann Ambrosius Barth. 8vo (211 x 132mm). Full volume, complete. 1048 pp. 7 folding lithographic plates. Ownership signature of K. von der Mühll, Leipzig attorney and mathematician; small private library paper label at the spine. Not ex-libris. Tightly and solidly bound in contemporary cloth, gilt-ruled and lettered at the spine. Minor scuffing and rubbing at the edges. Bright and very clean throughout. Very good condition. Barchas Collection 982; Dibner, Heralds of Science, 71; DSB, VI, pp. 340-350; Haskell Norman Library 1060; Honeyman Sale 1667; Magie, Source book in physics, p. 549; Printing and the Mind of Man 377; Sparrow, Milestones of Science 101.

Price: $950.00

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